Contribution
by Englandwouldfall
Summary: On five occasions, Sherlock contributed towards John's ever-growing-criminal record...


_So, I've been toying around with this idea for ages... but I've finally got round to actually writing it. I'm less happy with number three, so I may go back and edit that later... but I can't get it any better right now (insomnia means it's now been twenty something hours since I last slept, despite best attempts) and... well, I wanted to post it. It's a revision break. Ish._

* * *

-ONE-

The first time it happened, John was pissed.

In retrospect, the whole incident had been born out of a whole series of misunderstandings and miscommunications, neither of them quite on the same wave length as they usually were. John had been worried about the bills, his irritation flaring up after Sherlock ignored the beginning of his request to borrow some money (as though, at that point, he hadn't worked out that Sherlock was _drowning in it, _and by that point he definitely knew that Sherlock knew perfectly well what John was about to ask _and_ how much it cost his pride), and then Sebastian… the colleague comments… following Sherlock silently punishing him by pushing him out of the cases, John retaliating by finding a job that he barely wanted, and _of course _the ASBO.

Only a few months later the whole thing had turned into a bit of a joke. Sherlock bought it up in front of Anderson once, just to gauge his reaction, and then Lestrade got wind and made the classic 'wouldn't have thought you were the antisocial one of the pair of you, John' and then it spread to his old army mates, until he was three continent's Watson with the ASBO. By then it was funny, but at the time Sherlock had been pissed.

It wasn't just the matter of _being _arrested. Mostly, it was the fact that almost instantaneously, he'd made the decision to trust Sherlock Holmes. Trust issues be damned, his reaction to Sherlock had been innate, their relationship palpable after one day. They'd walked to that Chinese together and John had felt _good _for the first time since touching down in England; things felt _right _and he felt _valued _and _important._

And then Sherlock had gotten him an ASBO and didn't seem to actually _care, _and John was left questioning whether he'd over glamorized his memory of their first meeting. He'd shot a man to save his life and Sherlock couldn't even be arsed to drag him away from a community support officer.

It was the first time he'd ever questioned it.

-TWO-

"Sherlock," John hissed, wincing as he stepped on a creaky floorboard and wondered why the hell this was happening to _him, _"_Sherlock_!"

Ever since Sherlock had picked the lock of the apparent murder suspects house fifteen minutes ago, John had been saying his idiot of a flatmate's name on repeat as if, by saying it enough, the man would suddenly come to his senses. Or, at least, be irritated enough by the constant background noise (as John was sometimes deemed when there was a more interesting case at hand), that he at least explained why the hell they were breaking and entering, rather than getting a good night's sleep – in separate beds, thank you very much – back at Baker Street.

"I'm supposed to be at work in four hours," John said, continuing to follow the man up the stairs for reasons unknown. Then again, with Sherlock most of the reasoning was left unknown and, for the large part, John was happy with that status, because it was always preferable to realise that Sherlock had been manipulating someone's behaviour when he'd finished proving his point rather than half way through. Ethically, it never seemed as questionable _after_ Sherlock had cured a psychosomatic limp or gotten a woman to admit she was having an affair with the victim.

"Think of it as a _quaint_ addition to your blog." Sherlock returned, and given this was the first response he'd gotten from the man since he'd been dragged out of bed, and thrown into a taxi with a ceremonious '_come on, John' _it didn't exactly do anything to quench the Sherlock-rage that was about to bubble over and explode. John was a patient man for the large part, but they were treading a very thin line between just about getting away with breaking into someone's house and adding to his criminal record, neither of which exactly thrilled him when hours previously he'd been in bed having a perfectly nice dream about going to the pub with Sarah (boring, but he could do with more than that at the moment).

"Can't exactly post this on a public blog, Sherlock." John muttered, well aware that he was abusing his flatmates name but not quite able to stop himself; Sherlock's name tripped off his tongue all too naturally.

"Why not?" Sherlock said, stretching out his fingers and pressing his palm against the door before pushing it open. "Any idiot could deduce that -"

"- I don't think this is the sort of breaking and entering the general public has us pinned down for."

Sherlock stopped and turned around to face him, his expression an undeniable question that John didn't really want to answer. He hadn't exactly meant for the comment to become a conversation piece, and given Sherlock's lack of attention to everything he'd said in the past hour he hadn't really expected it to actually come up.

John shook his head slightly. Sherlock raised his eyebrows, waiting.

"It's more… breaking furniture and entering each other," John said. Sherlock's exhalation was either derisive or signified amusement, and frankly John was too exhausted to care all that much. "Look, can you just tell me what the hell is going on so I know what to tell Lestrade after he's clapped on the handcuffs?"

"Elizabeth Hunter stays at her lover's central London flat every second Tuesday," Sherlock said, stepping into the spare bedroom, "the proof that she killed her husband is in this room."

"Couldn't you have borrowed Lestrade's warrant card?" John said, before reminding himself that in the real world that wasn't actually a preferable option to the predicament he was currently in the middle of, and once again questioning how the hell he ended up on this side of the law, with this mad dick of a consulting detective, in a murderous adulterers house in the middle of the damn night.

Good God, he hadn't signed up for this.

"Donald Fish was partially sighted," Sherlock muttered, setting about the usual routine of picking up things and looking at them and sniffing them or whatever else he was doing to deduce something bloody brilliant from something that John hadn't even registered, "Elizabeth Hunter has near twenty twenty vision, and would likely have noticed the fact that I am not, in fact, Lestrade. Besides," Sherlock said, falling into an almost press up position to look under the bed, "this is easier."

"If you say so," John said, trying to stifle a yawn, "but if this goes to court, I'm pleading ignorance."

"Your firearms." Sherlock said, standing up and pulling John's gun out of his pocket for a split second before returning it to the depths of his coat.

"Armed robbery," John said, feeling the onslaught of a migraine settling at the front of his forehead. And Sherlock, with his self-diagnosed clever expression, who seemed to have located something that had a bearing on the case, or was else just very interested in the corked perfume bottle he'd found in the second draw, turned back to face him.

"We haven't taken anything."

And that really didn't make him feel any better.

John was just considering that the whole thing couldn't possibly get any worse, when he heard the unmistakable sound of someone breaking down the front door.

"I'm going to kill you," John muttered, pressing a hand to his forehead and silently thinking _not a-bloody-gain, _because it wasn't like this was the first time, "I swear, Sherlock,"

Sherlock pressed a finger to his lips, pressing himself against the wall of the bedroom for a second.

"It's Lestrade," Sherlock said.

"Wonderful," John said, his whisper cracking slightly, "_wonderful._ Brilliant. I'm sure he'll be just _thrilled _to find us here…_for God's sake, Sherlock, hide the bloody gun." _

Sherlock sent him a look which roughly translated to 'do you think I'm stupid, John' to which John returned with a glare that quite clearly said, _'well given you're about to get us arrested again, Sherlock, yes you're a bloody idiot.' _Sherlock rolled his eyes and pocketed the bottle of perfume.

"Well?" John asked.

"What?"

"Well, I didn't particularly _want _to get arrested this evening, Sherlock,"

"It doesn't matter," Sherlock said, waving this aside, "we have the murder weapon."

"So now we're stealing evidence, too?"

"_Problem_?"

"Oh don't get me _started,_" John hissed, grabbing a fitful of Sherlock's coat and glaring at him, "even for you this is –"

"Police!" One of Lestrade's officers yelled, and then the door of the bedroom was kicked open and John found himself facing down a torch and a group of people who were, essentially, sort of, in a mad way, his work colleagues.

"Are your entrances always this overly dramatic, Lestrade?" Sherlock asked, unperturbed. John let go of the front of Sherlock's coat and tried very hard _not _to swear, but good God he had to have the most ridiculous flatmate of all time.

"Oh for fu…" Greg Lestrade began, rolling his eyes and dropping out of his aggressive stance, "Donovan, its _Sherlock," _Greg half-yelled down the corridor.

"Search him," Sally Donovan said, stepping into the room with the rest of the team, presumably the back-up, looking just as unimpressed as John felt about the whole thing.

_Oh God, they were going to find the gun._

"I wouldn't advise that, if I were you," Sherlock said, smoothly.

"Yeah, well, I don't much feel like _consulting_ with you right now," Greg muttered.

"If your officers search me," Sherlock said, "they're only going to be contaminating evidence from the Hunter case," Sherlock said, "and, presumably, that's going to be hard to explain in your paperwork, particularly without my cooperation."

John swallowed. Not only had they been caught in the middle of a damned armed_ sodding robbery _(John wasn't entirely sure he was ever going to forgive Sherlock for this, really he didn't), but now Sherlock was as good as _blackmailing _Lestrade into _not _searching them.

"Save if for the station," Lestrade said, eyes fixed on Sherlock calculatingly, "and he'll ride in the back of my car and, Sherlock, you're going to tell me what the _hell _this place has to do with Elizabeth Hunter."

0o0o0

John had been utterly confused when, upon searching Sherlock at the station, he'd pulled out nothing but the bottle of perfume, proceeding to explain how the poison worked with the usual satisfied expression… it was after they'd been granted bail (thank you, Mycroft), that Sherlock had feigned suddenly realise he must have left his phone in the back of Lestrade's car.

The three of them had walked back out to the police car. John was beginning to feel the spark of a realisation at the back of his brain, but Sherlock couldn't _possibly _have –

– But, yes, Sherlock pulled his phone out from underneath the driver's seat and, whilst his godamn coat blocked Lestrade's view, he twisted out the gun from where it was wedged between the seats, twirling it between his fingers before pocketing it with a grin.

And John had been caught half way between incredulity and disbelief, unsure whether he should laugh or cry, but suddenly remember _why _he was so willing to put his trust in a man who could get him arrested so easily.

Sherlock was a bloody genius and maybe his methods were unorthodox, but the man had it all under control.

-THREE-

"_Sherlock_," John spat (and it was funny how many times these situations seemed to start with John trying to pull Sherlock out of the realms of insanity and back into the realm of _sensible), _"Cocaine isn't the sort of evidence you can keep hold of and give Lestrade later."

Sherlock turned his gaze towards him, long fingers still holding the bag of white powder a little too comfortably for John's liking. They'd talked about the whole drugs thing before, obviously, but this was the first time the issue had been brought to the present so violently. Sherlock's expression seemed to excrete the _'don't you trust me' _vibe, which – frankly – made John want to pull some of his hair out, because _that _had nothing to do with the fact of why it probably wasn't a good idea to keep hold of this amount of cocaine.

"That's hardly the question at hand here, Sherlock," John muttered irritably, "Possession is _very _illegal,"

"There are hardly degrees of the law,"

"Yeah," John had countered, "there are. There's the '_oh Lestrade will let us off with an eye roll' _and then there's holding onto a _significant _amount of cocaine because it doesn't fit in with your plans to talk to Lestrade yet,"

"He would interfere," Sherlock countered.

"Yes," John agreed, "with the very large quantity of cocaine that we just discovered."

"If the drug squad arrive then we'll _never _find the man who murdered Jim Harrison, the trail will run cold within twelve hours." Sherlock said, irritably, as if that was enough justification for making them liable for a serious criminal sentence. Problem with Sherlock was, that was plenty justification; if there was a puzzle still to be solved, then the consequences of their actions barely mattered, and Sherlock had been hot on the trail of this for over a week.

And could Lestrade really complain? Sherlock _was_ about to catch him both a serial killer and a drug dealer, which was surely enough to allow them a half hour… normally, he'd have just relied on Lestrade's discretion, but whenever cocaine and Sherlock were involved the man was, understandably, slightly trigger happy.

But John _knew _where Sherlock was at the moment and he was _very _far away from cocaine.

God help him.

"Twenty minutes," John said, feeling something heavy sit at the back of his throat, "is that going to be enough time?"

"Yes," Sherlock said, slipping the packet of white power into his pocket.

"Give it here," John muttered, holding out the palm of his hand and closing his eyes for a brief second. The whole thing was going to be bad enough to explain to Lestrade anyway, but if Sherlock was found with the stuff then it would all be infinitely worse: last time Lestrade had suspected Sherlock was high (and he'd been right, thanks to a minor relapsed caused by sodding Irene Adler), Sherlock had been off cases for far too long for it to be healthy for John's safety.

The man had taken up cigarettes and had and started genuinely considering (and taking) cases about glow in the dark rabbits before Lestrade had been willing to let him back on a crime scene, and before then he'd followed them to Dartmoor to keep an eye on them. None of them needed that to deal with.

"You don't trust me," Sherlock said, eyes narrowing slightly.

"Just give me the bloody cocaine, Sherlock," John countered, silently rating this up there with one of the most ridiculous conversations they'd had to date. Sherlock held the bag slightly out of his reach still, expression fixed on inquisitive, eyes dissecting him.

"Your concern is illogical at best –"

" – I'm _not _bloody concerned," John said, irritably. Sherlock raised an eyebrow in a silent question, "well, fine, I am _concerned, _but that's what possession will do to a bloke."

"I am hardly going to have a chance to _shoot up _in twenty minutes,"

"I know," John said, frustrated, "it's not a matter of _my trust,"_

"You think that Lestrade will not believe me," Sherlock said, still holding the white packet slightly out of reach.

John didn't add that he thought letting an ex-addict keep possession of his drug of choice, even for twenty minutes, was just idiotic because that went without saying. It was hardly a matter of not trusting Sherlock, but Sherlock should have better things to think about than the _temptation _sitting heavy in his pocket. Of course he wasn't going to allow Sherlock to walk around with any amount of cocaine in his coat pocket, whatever the good cause. It was _pointless _trouble.

"Good deduction," John said, palm outstretched, "now hand it over, Sherlock, your twenty minutes are ticking away."

As it turned out, it wasn't Lestrade who arrested him and the Sergeant didn't think all that much of John's 'I was just…looking after if for Detective Inspector Lestrade.' Apparently, it hadn't been very convincing, at least until Lestrade had turned up and begrudgingly admitted John's probable innocence.

He'd been left stewing in a cell for quite some time though; enough time that he should have been able to conjure up a desire to have acted slightly differently, but he didn't quite manage it.

-FOUR-

He can still feel the raw emotion behind number four.

The whole god damn time and Sherlock only lost his temper twice, somehow twisting things in his head to think John might somehow _believe _that Sherlock was capable of something like that, anything like that and it was right after those blithe confessions ("_I know you" "a hundred percent"_) and then… a phone call and crumbling gingerbread…

Sherlock never told him what was going on. He had no idea that Lestrade would arrive and try and take him to the station for questioning until Lestrade was already there, and Sherlock knew – of course he knew – and that was more than proof enough of this stupid game (as if he needed proof, as if there was anything in the whole god damn world that could make him doubt Sherlock for a second… but Sherlock had known what was going to happen before it happened, always wanted step ahead. _Always). _

Sherlock had always been good at dredging up too much righteous anger from his gut. He still wasn't sure how it had happened, but the first time he'd met him he'd been defending him (_passionately demanding 'have you met him?' to a bunch of police officers, as if he, himself, had met him before that bloody day)_ and then he'd continued to do so.

It was just… Sherlock had a way of riling people up. Sometimes, the bloke deserved it. Sherlock was a complete dick most of the time and, sure, John wanted to hit him several times a day (had on occasion, in fact – although that was after the violence was requested), but that didn't mean their _god damn friends _could walk into their _god damn flat _and arrest Sherlock on some stupid charge that barely made sense.

"It's all right, John," Sherlock had said, almost bored with the proceedings, but John had been livid. Mrs Hudson, shocked and horrified, nearly crying, and Greg and bloody _Sally Donovan _–

"_You done?" _John asked, his everything heating up with this _rage _because everything was just crumbling, right there, and Sally Donovan was satisfied because she thought she'd made some stupid point. They were still talking and John was just trying not to lose it… but she doesn't seem to care that this is John's _life. _This is John's best friend… his Sherlock, and he's being _dragged down the stairs in handcuffs and – _

The Chief Superintendent.

" – Looked a bit of a weirdo, if you ask me."

John doesn't care. He doesn't _care_ whatever god damn rank the guy in front of him is, because he is absolutely and a hundred percent _done _with people insinuating that Sherlock is some sort of freak, as if he isn't the brilliant arrogant _genius _that John knows him to be. He is _so _fucking fed up of people like Sebastian and Sally Donovan and Anderson not seeing Sherlock as a person and saying all this _stuff _as if it's okay, just because it's Sherlock, when it's not.

_It's not okay, none of this is okay. _

"Often are, these vigilante types," the guy's gaze lands on him, his arsehole expression twisting slightly, "What are _you_ looking at?"

John's white hot rage and pulsing anger, and he doesn't even care. It's honest to God against the solider within him to even _consider _punching someone so far up the food chain in terms of rank, but this is Sherlock and the bloke's a fucking _tosser _and John is so _so _done with people treating Sherlock like shit _for no reason. _

(John thinks it's a bit misleading for Donovan to try and pin that arrest on Sherlock too, if anything, John definitely _earned _that one).

From there, the memory derails slightly in a rush of adrenaline and the horrible stirring grief in his gut. He remembers being slammed against the police car, but the feeling of _calm _and _it's going to be okay _when Sherlock turned to face him, just for a second, as if he'd been expecting it.

That was the best arrest out of the lot of them, John decided. He'd had a gun pointed at his head, was turned into a bloody hostage and ran from the police; absolutely and completely sodding ridiculous, as was usually the case.

"_Take my hand." _

He hadn't even cared.

-FIVE-

"This is the fifth time the man's gotten you arrested, John," Sally Donovan says, sitting across the interview table (and damn it does John not want to see _her _of all people right now), "Sherlock Holmes is not your friend,"

John wants to correct her use of tense. He wants to say _'was' _not '_is' _but that sparks off a memory of Sherlock pretending to be some theoretically dead bloke's friend, highlighting his not-quite-widow's subtle use of tense.

"_Bit premature, they've only just found the car."_

John swallows.

There's this sticky feeling of dread still lining his stomach. Obviously, it hasn't hit him yet. Obviously, he's dizzy with the denial, but there's still that fuzzy awareness that it's there, waiting for him to get back to it. It's the way he feels before the nightmares of the wars start and he's not looking forward to it. Then again, he's not madly sure he's capable of looking forward to _anything _right now.

"Where were you on the night of the kidnapping?"

"Baker Street," John manages, but his voice sounds flat. He's sat on the other side of the interview room too many times for this to be okay. _No, it's not all right. This is ridiculous. Ridiculous. _

"Is there anyone who can attest to that?"

_Sherlock _can attest to that, or could, once. And the whole thing's so ridiculous that John wants to break something. It's not okay, this. It's not, it's not, it's not.

_Not anymore. _

He wants to beg her to _stop _because he can't do this right now. He's not sure when he will be able to do it, though, and he's not sure what else he can do. What he wants is to slip back into yesterday, or a few months back, or anything that isn't _right now _because, Christ, they only just finished pulling his best friend off the pavement and he can't, he's not –

"He was there all night," John says, but the words are sticking in his throat and _he won't breakdown in front of Donovan he won't, god damn, but… _"he _didn't." _

He can't say his name. That's just not going to happen. He says it all the fucking time. It's a warning, a word of relief, an exclamation of relief. He flat out _always _abused the man's name, the world falling off his tongue and into the air between them. _Sherlock, Sherlock, Sherlock. _He's never used anyone's name like he uses his, like it's the holy grail, or the answer to everyone question, like it's a way of grappling with the space between them and pulling him back to reality. He could rein him in with a word. _Sherlock, Sherlock, Sherlock. _

Sherlock Holmes is dead.

"And you can vouch for the whole night?" The other officer asks, one that John doesn't know too well, and _of course _he can't. John and… him, they always kept odd hours; disappearing out at stupid times for stupid reasons. He barely _remembers _the night in question because it was so innocuous and ordinary and domestic that he'd spent the past thirty minutes trying to remember what they'd eaten for dinner.

"Because of Sherlock Holmes," Sally Donovan says, forcing herself back into the conversation (there's an edge of desperation in her voice, because she wants to prove conclusively that Sherlock was guilty, because then she isn't guilty for… for forcing him up to the top of that building and… and then…), "you have been given an ASBO, been arrested for possession, breaking and entering, assaulting a police officer and on suspicion of involvement in abduction and kidnapping – "

John can feel something sticking in his throat because _god damn _he'd give fucking _anything _to be being arrested for breaking and entering right now, to have… him pulling him into some stupid elaborate scheme and John huffing behind him, or maybe trying not to laugh in some inappropriate conversation or situation. Sally Donovan seems to think that bringing up Sherlock's contribution to his criminal record is going to flick some switch over in his brain, and suddenly John will see some kind of sense and start spilling all these stories (stories that don't exist, mind), but all he can think is _those were the best moments of my whole damn life _and his throat _hurts _and his hand's shaking slightly.

His leg hurts and his _everything _hurts and he's _so tried _and –

-_oh God, oh God, Sherlock is dead he's dead he's dead he's dead – _

- John chokes on nothing, his hands resting stoically on the table because he's not going to cry, here, in the interview room, because Sherlock's never going to get him arrested again and _well _it's shitty and it hurts, but this is _it. _

And it's stupid to get sentimental about a fucking criminal record, but God John can't even… he doesn't know what he's supposed _to do _because he… he just _fell and falling falling falling… _

"I know you don't want to hear it, John," Donovan says, voice near pleading with him now, "but you have to accept the possibility that Sherlock was guilty."

There it is; the past tense, pushing into conversation and jarring all wrong in John's head. _Bit premature, they've only just found the car. _The words are running over each other in John's head (alongside other words he doesn't want to think about, words like 'this is my note..' and…and all those things that John won't mention, won't mention to anyone…) repeating and pulsing through his head like a headache, only it's just a memory of all those things he… used to say. Those remarkable, wonderful things.

And there it is, the past tense. _Used to say. _

John thinks he might be sick.

"He wasn't," John finally forces out, "and… and we're each other's alibis, so if you think you can find enough evidence out of _nothing _to press charges, then go ahead."

Sally Donovan doesn't _smirk _at him like she usually would if he'd said something like that, but then circumstances are difference. The pity barely permeates through his attempt at composure, so he goes back to staring at his hands and trying _trying _not to think.

All in all, he thinks the third arrest might have been his favourite. Or maybe it was the fourth, after all. All in all... _he_ is the only man who could _possibly _make him miss being a-sodding-rrested... and he's never going to admit that to anyone, not ever, (because it's stupid and dumb) but his contribution's to everything are such that John couldn't even _begin _to express... begin to make someone understand... and its just...

_Sherlock._

Sally stops the recording tape and says "questioning to be resumed later" and then she's out the room and into the corridor outside, leaving John alone with the other officer and the utter _silence. _

John thinks she might possibly be crying.


End file.
